Chapter 2: 6.viii

Constitution burst in Pieces.

Thus is the Tenth of August won and lost. Patriotism reckons its
slain by thousand on thousand, so deadly was the Swiss fire from
these windows; but will finally reduce them to some Twelve
hundred. No child’s play was it;—nor is it! Till two in the
afternoon the massacring, the breaking and the burning has not
ended; nor the loose Bedlam shut itself again.

How deluges of frantic Sansculottism roared through all passages
of this Tuileries, ruthless in vengeance, how the Valets were
butchered, hewn down; and Dame Campan saw the Marseilles sabre
flash over her head, but the Blackbrowed said, ‘_Va-t-en_, Get
thee gone,’ and flung her from him unstruck:[509] how in the
cellars wine-bottles were broken, wine-butts were staved in and
drunk; and, upwards to the very garrets, all windows tumbled out
their precious royal furnitures; and, with gold mirrors, velvet
curtains, down of ript feather-beds, and dead bodies of men, the
Tuileries was like no Garden of the Earth:—all this let him who
has a taste for it see amply in Mercier, in acrid Montgaillard,
or Beaulieu of the _Deux Amis_. A hundred and eighty bodies of
Swiss lie piled there; naked, unremoved till the second day.
Patriotism has torn their red coats into snips; and marches with
them at the Pike’s point: the ghastly bare corpses lie there,
under the sun and under the stars; the curious of both sexes
crowding to look. Which let not us do. Above a hundred carts
heaped with Dead fare towards the Cemetery of Sainte-Madeleine;
bewailed, bewept; for all had kindred, all had mothers, if not
here, then there. It is one of those Carnage-fields, such as you
read of by the name “Glorious Victory,” brought home in this case
to one’s own door.

But the blackbrowed Marseillese have struck down the Tyrant of
the Château. He is struck down; low, and hardly to rise. What a
moment for an august Legislative was that when the Hereditary
Representative entered, under such circumstances; and the
Grenadier, carrying the little Prince Royal out of the Press, set
him down on the Assembly-table! A moment,—which one had to smooth
off with oratory; waiting what the next would bring! Louis said
few words: ‘He was come hither to prevent a great crime; he
believed himself safer nowhere than here.’ President Vergniaud
answered briefly, in vague oratory as we say, about ‘defence of
Constituted Authorities,’ about dying at our post.[510] And so
King Louis sat him down; first here, then there; for a difficulty
arose, the Constitution not permitting us to debate while the
King is present: finally he settles himself with his Family in
the “_Loge_ of the _Logographe_” in the Reporter’s-Box of a
Journalist: which is beyond the enchanted Constitutional Circuit,
separated from it by a rail. To such Lodge of the _Logographe_,
measuring some ten feet square, with a small closet at the
entrance of it behind, is the King of broad France now limited:
here can he and his sit pent, under the eyes of the world, or
retire into their closet at intervals; for the space of sixteen
hours. Such quiet peculiar moment has the Legislative lived to
see.

But also what a moment was that other, few minutes later, when
the three Marseillese cannon went off, and the Swiss rolling-fire
and universal thunder, like the Crack of Doom, began to rattle!
Honourable Members start to their feet; stray bullets singing
epicedium even here, shivering in with window-glass and jingle.
‘No, this is our post; let us die here!’ They sit therefore, like
stone Legislators. But may not the Lodge of the _Logographe_ be
forced from behind? Tear down the railing that divides it from
the enchanted Constitutional Circuit! Ushers tear and tug; his
Majesty himself aiding from within: the railing gives way;
Majesty and Legislative are united in place, unknown Destiny
hovering over both.

Rattle, and again rattle, went the thunder; one breathless
wide-eyed messenger rushing in after another: King’s orders to
the Swiss went out. It was a fearful thunder; but, as we know, it
ended. Breathless messengers, fugitive Swiss, denunciatory
Patriots, trepidation; finally tripudiation!—Before four o’clock
much has come and gone.

The New Municipals have come and gone; with Three Flags,
_Liberté, Egalité, Patrie_, and the clang of vivats. Vergniaud,
he who as President few hours ago talked of Dying for Constituted
Authorities, has moved, as Committee-Reporter, that the
Hereditary Representative _be suspended;_ that a NATIONAL
CONVENTION do forthwith assemble to say what further! An able
Report: which the President must have had ready in his pocket? A
President, in such cases, must have much ready, and yet not
ready; and Janus-like look before and after.

King Louis listens to all; retires about midnight “to three
little rooms on the upper floor;” till the Luxembourg be prepared
for him, and “the safeguard of the Nation.” Safer if Brunswick
were once here! Or, alas, not so safe? Ye hapless discrowned
heads! Crowds came, next morning, to catch a climpse of them, in
their three upper rooms. Montgaillard says the august Captives
wore an air of cheerfulness, even of gaiety; that the Queen and
Princess Lamballe, who had joined her over night, looked out of
the open window, “shook powder from their hair on the people
below, and laughed.”[511] He is an acrid distorted man.

For the rest, one may guess that the Legislative, above all that
the New Municipality continues busy. Messengers, Municipal or
Legislative, and swift despatches rush off to all corners of
France; full of triumph, blended with indignant wail, for Twelve
hundred have fallen. France sends up its blended shout
responsive; the Tenth of August shall be as the Fourteenth of
July, only bloodier and greater. The Court has conspired? Poor
Court: the Court has been vanquished; and will have both the
scath to bear and the scorn. How the Statues of Kings do now all
fall! Bronze Henri himself, though he wore a cockade once,
jingles down from the Pont Neuf, where _Patrie_ floats _in
Danger_. Much more does Louis Fourteenth, from the Place Vendôme,
jingle down, and even breaks in falling. The curious can remark,
written on his horse’s shoe: “12 _Août_ 1692;” a Century and a
Day.

The Tenth of August was Friday. The week is not done, when our
old Patriot Ministry is recalled, what of it can be got: strict
Roland, Genevese Clavière; add heavy Monge the Mathematician,
once a stone-hewer; and, for Minister of Justice,—Danton “led
hither,” as himself says, in one of his gigantic figures,
“through the breach of Patriot cannon!” These, under Legislative
Committees, must rule the wreck as they can: confusedly enough;
with an old Legislative waterlogged, with a New Municipality so
brisk. But National Convention will get itself together; and
_then!_ Without delay, however, let a New Jury-Court and Criminal
Tribunal be set up in Paris, to try the crimes and conspiracies
of the Tenth. High Court of Orléans is distant, slow: the blood
of the Twelve hundred Patriots, whatever become of other blood,
shall be inquired after. Tremble, ye Criminals and Conspirators;
the Minister of Justice is Danton! Robespierre too, after the
victory, sits in the New Municipality; insurrectionary
“improvised Municipality,” which calls itself Council General of
the Commune.

For three days now, Louis and his Family have heard the
Legislative Debates in the Lodge of the _Logographe;_ and retired
nightly to their small upper rooms. The Luxembourg and safeguard
of the Nation could not be got ready: nay, it seems the
Luxembourg has too many cellars and issues; no Municipality can
undertake to watch it. The compact Prison of the Temple, not so
elegant indeed, were much safer. To the Temple, therefore! On
Monday, 13th day of August 1792, in Mayor Pétion’s carriage,
Louis and his sad suspended Household, fare thither; all Paris
out to look at them. As they pass through the Place Vendôme Louis
Fourteenth’s Statue lies broken on the ground. Pétion is afraid
the Queen’s looks may be thought scornful, and produce
provocation; she casts down her eyes, and does not look at all.
The “press is prodigious,” but quiet: here and there, it shouts
_Vive la Nation;_ but for most part gazes in silence. French
Royalty vanishes within the gates of the Temple: these old peaked
Towers, like peaked Extinguisher or _Bonsoir_, do cover it
up;—from which same Towers, poor Jacques Molay and his Templars
were burnt out, by French Royalty, five centuries since. Such are
the turns of Fate below. Foreign Ambassadors, English Lord Gower
have all demanded passports; are driving indignantly towards
their respective homes.

So, then, the Constitution is over? For ever and a day! Gone is
that wonder of the Universe; First biennial Parliament,
waterlogged, waits only till the Convention come; and will then
sink to endless depths.

One can guess the silent rage of Old-Constituents,
Constitution-builders, extinct Feuillants, men who thought the
Constitution would march! Lafayette rises to the altitude of the
situation; at the head of his Army. Legislative Commissioners are
posting towards him and it, on the Northern Frontier, to
congratulate and perorate: he orders the Municipality of Sedan to
arrest these Commissioners, and keep them strictly in ward as
Rebels, till he say further. The Sedan Municipals obey.

The Sedan Municipals obey: but the Soldiers of the Lafayette
Army? The Soldiers of the Lafayette Army have, as all Soldiers
have, a kind of dim feeling that they themselves are Sansculottes
in buff belts; that the victory of the Tenth of August is also a
victory for them. They will not rise and follow Lafayette to
Paris; they will rise and _send_ him thither! On the 18th, which
is but next Saturday, Lafayette, with some two or three indignant
Staff-officers, one of whom is Old-Constituent Alexandre de
Lameth, having first put his Lines in what order he could,—rides
swiftly over the Marches, towards Holland. Rides, alas, swiftly
into the claws of Austrians! He, long-wavering, trembling on the
verge of the horizon, has set, in Olmutz Dungeons; this History
knows him no more. Adieu, thou Hero of two worlds; thinnest, but
compact honour-worthy man! Through long rough night of captivity,
through other tumults, triumphs and changes, thou wilt swing
well, “fast-anchored to the Washington Formula;” and be the Hero
and Perfect-character, were it only of one idea. The Sedan
Municipals repent and protest; the Soldiers shout _Vive la
Nation_. Dumouriez Polymetis, from his Camp at Maulde, sees
himself made Commander in Chief.

And, O Brunswick! what sort of “military execution” will Paris
merit now? Forward, ye well-drilled exterminatory men; with your
artillery-waggons, and camp kettles jingling. Forward, tall
chivalrous King of Prussia; fanfaronading Emigrants and war-god
Broglie, “for some consolation to mankind,” which verily is not
without need of some.

END OF THE SECOND VOLUME.

VOLUME III.
THE GUILLOTINE

Alle Freiheits-Apostel, sie waren mir immer zuwider;
Willkür suchte doch nur Jeder am Ende für sich.
Willst du Viele befrein, so wag’ es Vielen zu dienen.
Wie gefährlich das sey, willst du es wissen? Versuch’s!

GOETHE.

BOOK 3.I.
SEPTEMBER